creeping featurism

a.k.a. feature creep

The tendency for programmers to add more and more features to a software product in an attempt to "keep up with the Joneses" (or in this case, to keep up with stiff competition from other companies). It generally produces a slow, clunky program.

This term also refers to the tendency for project requirements to take more time and money than anticipated. A similar concept is "scope creep."